Vijay Vijayasankar

General Manager of AI,Analytics,IOT and Watson Health for North America in IBM GBS . Proud Alum of University of Kerala . Geek, Engineer , Blogger and dog lover . Previously senior executive at SAP and MongoDB.

In 2015, when I was given the chance to lead a services portfolio that included AI, I was quite excited for two reasons. One – it perfectly suited my geeky interests (especially my passion for math) and two – it seemed to me that I was back in 2000 with ERP, with every company wanting […]

To some degree, we all need some validation to feel good and perform better . As we grow as leaders, it becomes a big part of our lives to balance the need for validation of folks in our team. Too little and they may never realize full potential and too much and you will never […]

The first time I saw bottled water being sold at the TRIVANDRUM Central railway station, I remember it being a big joke in my family . We continued taking water from home when we travelled for a couple more years, constantly making fun of those “Bisleri” vendors, and the idiot travelers who could have just […]

One of the most embarrassing professional development moments for me was a class on communication that I took as a trainee in TCS in 1999. The instructor video taped me – and went through the replay, pointing out everything that went wrong with my short presentation, in excruciating detail. He concluded with “If you don’t […]

I can’t believe that 2018 is nearly over ! I have been checking in one folks that I mentor for the last couple of weeks to see how well everyone is doing before we all head for vacation time. Those with a sales quota that hasn’t been retired generally are on an overdrive of emotions […]

I saw the news on twitter yesterday night that SAP is buying Qualtrics for $8B cash – most of it financed . I am writing this blog post strictly in my personal capacity and it doesn’t represent my employer’s opinions . I have no prior knowledge of this deal. I have worked in the SAP […]

Ok – few disclaimers first . I am an IBM executive and I hold some IBM stock. I had no involvement in this acquistion – I only found out when I saw it on social media yesterday afternoon. And I am not a company spokesperson – this is my personal blog and what I say […]

First things first – jet lag sucks more as I grow older . Not that long ago , I was able to function just fine with a different time zone every day as I flew around the world . This time in India – it was quite hard to shake it off , and it […]

If there is one sentence I have heard the most as an excuse in my career, it would be “I didn’t have the time to get to it”. This would be totally fine if it came from someone who had to do multiple jobs to take care of their family, or something along similar lines. […]

I woke up early on Saturday – and sat with a cup of coffee in our backyard, and saw this beautiful reflection. Of course I had to take a photo Friday was an incredibly busy day. I had to wake up at 4AM EST in NY to catch a flight home. I hadn’t slept much […]